“Competencies are already a central matter in departments and schools that must
gain accreditation from professional bodies.... Whatever shape they’re in, though,
there is much work to be done in making those competencies real for our students
and ourselves. It will require that we talk with each other in departments and
across departments and ranks and tracks, none of which will be easy. Some of
this already happens at Temple, but all too rarely in my experience."

"I would argue that
today there are some fundamental skills every student should have. Some business
skills, for example.... Then, let’s come to diversity. This part of Gen Ed has a
very noble goal, it is essential to creating a harmonious society." -
Provost Hai-Lung Dai

"As is the case for local students, including
international students in class discussion is vital to keeping them engaged and
confirming that they’re understanding material. They may simply need more time
and different kinds of encouragement from professors and classmates to
participate. There are many proven ways to elicit participation from
international students without intimidating or embarrassing
them."

“There are, however, signs of hope that we can help create a culture of trust at
Temple, and we should do what we can to nurture them by making it clear that
faculty should be trusted and that we are open to trusting administrators if the
right systems are established to boost our confidence."

"...“that’s an issue
we’re tracking weekly. What is the diversity of our applicant pool, our admit
pool, our in-state/out-of-state, all of those things matter. We are a public
university of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and that’s where we start the
discussion." - President Neil Theobald

"We believe that progress in these 6 areas
are of vital interest to all members of the Temple University community and that
it is incumbent upon the University faculty to work with the new University
administration to ensure that appropriate steps are taken to ensure the
integrity of the University both with regard to internal operations and the
image it projects.”

The
Price of Performing a Mitzvah at Temple University: The Cost of Caring for One’s
Fellow Human Beings in the 21st Century

By Michael
Sirover

"At Temple, in 2013, we may face two contradictory goals,
i.e., the need to establish a firm economic foundation as we go forward in the
21st century and our commitment to our fellow human beings... How we deal with this
challenge may reveal the nature of our character and the strength of our
convictions."

“This should be self-evident, but it clearly needs repeating: Whatever futures
for the university are conjured in reports and business plans, real universities
cannot exist, let alone thrive, without the active participation of the faculty."

"...so that’s part of
what we need—that mission, especially with the medical school but also the
university. What’s the story we want to tell, and how are going to tell that
story, and how are we going to make sure that people know about Temple
University?" - President Neil Theobald

"Deans have held their job at the pleasure
of the president, but the president has had little more to assess the quality of
a dean’s performance than the president’s subjective opinion, aided by equally
subjective input from other senior officers, and occasionally supplemented by
anecdote, rumor, innuendo and backdoor politicking.”

"These are serious workplace environment issues that
impact instructors and students and should be treated as such. The Task Force
plans to meet this spring with the Dean of Students and others to begin
addressing these matters."

"My concern about MOOCs is that... the
drive to democratize higher education, in this latest form, will not stop long
enough to conduct, analyze, and reflect on studies of what this new pedagogy is
achieving, and at what cost, perhaps, in terms other than those of the
bottom-line mind-set."

"In light of Provost Dai’s presentation on
the move to Responsibility Centered Budgeting at the last Faculty Senate
Meeting, we decided to ask several faculty members who have expressed an
interest in, or had some background thinking about, this model for their
reflections on its possibilities for Temple."

"This Report of the CLA Ad Hoc Interdisciplinary Studies Committee
assesses the impact of changes made in the status of five separate programs
after one full year: American Studies, Asian Studies, Jewish Studies, Latin
American Studies, and Women’s Studies/LGBT Studies... The Report is reproduced
here in full."

"In celebration of the receipt of Great
Teachers awards by three women faculty members, the Committee on Status of Women
Faculty at Temple University developed a survey intended to bring out the nature
and reasons for their successes. The Herald is delighted to publish their
responses."

" In the long run, what will make Temple great is the quality
of the teaching and intellectual life here, especially in the areas that
everyone should care about – I mean, the basics as well as the cutting edge in
the humanities, social sciences, and sciences. "

“During this challenging period, when
shared governance is being opposed by outside forces and we are in the process
of a leadership transition, it seems to me that it is essential that we run
counter to the current critical trend."

"The main costs of running a reputable press are not in the
mechanics of getting the books on the shelves, but in the intellectual labor
required to transform a manuscript into something worthy of the label “book” in
the first place."

"This is not a condemnation of Temple, but
of the movement of the institution to join others in an environment in which
upper administration and boards are more worried about PR and bigger and bigger
things, populations and buildings, rather than human beings in the enterprise of
teaching and learning."